CRITIQUE

Originally from Mulhouse, Gabrielle Meyer has twin passions: painting and horses.

Painting is a very personal voyage of discovery linked to an artist’s own inner, individual development and which all artists work out in their own way.

Gabrielle Meyer’s style is figurative with use of colour its most striking feature.

She works on canvas in the customary way using a knife here, paintbrushes, brushes and rags there, each in turn helping her realises what she has in her mind’s eye.

All the available space is filled with multifarious coloured shapes that play their part in the overall architecture.

To its geometric precision is added an unrestrained range of colour which blazes with life.

Her colours, with their acid-drop tones are laid on the canvas in thin layers packed with oils or acrylics that sustain a remarkable translucence: intense yellows rub shoulders with flaming oranges, themselves highlighted by touches of elegant reds which in turn are enlivened by bright shades of blue.

It all goes to make a symphony of colour which is a delight to the eye.

The drawn aspect of her work has, for the most part, three features: animals, still life and the nude.

Outlines are well drawn, although occasionally less so in the case of a few nudes whose contours suggest a slight hesitation.

The same is true of her paintings of horses.

Their bodies are rounded, with nothing out of place and they have an almost sensual feel.

Lines cross the canvas or open up to make curving segments and define the structural framework of the paintings. These segments then enliven the visual drive of the images.

The energy in the line is pleasing to the eye as well as the lightness of the graphics. This technique uses glaze to achieve some of its effects but also on occasion a kind of more or less transparent “veil” which gives a surprising illusion of space.

Whether interpreting the world around us or making a more personal statement, G.M. offers a whole world in which the everyday intermingles with poetic licence.

There is a captivating strength, an all-pervading beauty of light, a precision in the brush stroke and a fullness of movement that feed the emotions of the viewer.

The ever-present concern for subtle shifts in light and transparency make G.M.s work a very special journey of visual emotions.

This former student of the painter Christian Poirot makes a very strong statement about colour through the medium of her work.

When she invites us into her fairy-tale world, we have every reason to go along with her…